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Gazette Staff Writer

Tamera Lowe, left, and Roger Moore / Gazette file photos

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CHILLICOTHE — At the end of August, Mayor Jack Everson announced he was suspending the police chief for insubordination, but the suspension never took place.

An investigation by The Gazette has turned up no evidence that Chief Roger Moore ever served any suspension resulting from his actions during an August incident at the city building. Meanwhile, the safety service director said last month that the disciplinary measure had been altered, but there’s no official record of that change.

Everson declined to speak on record about why the discipline was changed, saying he was advised by legal counsel that “the detail is protected by statute.” When asked to specify what statute, he responded via email: “Nice try — No comment.”

Law Director Sherri Rutherford said there are no statutes that prevent a mayor from speaking with the media, but she did note that Everson obviously isn’t obligated to do so. She further said she hadn’t given legal advice to Everson regarding the exemption he referenced.

A decision changed

The community was led to believe Moore would serve a one-day, unpaid suspension after an Aug. 30 news release to media from Everson.

The release was in response to an Aug. 22 incident between Moore and Tamra Lowe, Equal Employment Opportunity and Fair Housing director. Lowe called 911 after Moore refused to leave her office, saying she felt intimidated.

Moore, who captured the interaction on audio recording, went to her office requesting an EEO complaint form to file a complaint on Lowe.

Everson wrote in the release that Moore’s actions brought negative, embarrassing attention on the city.

“As Mayor, I cannot allow this type of activity to continue within my administration, especially by staff members. All city employees work for the taxpayers of Chillicothe and we are expected to perform our jobs with the highest to integrity and in the best interest of the taxpayers. It is my intent to ensure that happens,” Everson wrote.

The Gazette submitted an April 8 records request for emails between the mayor, Moore and Safety Service Director Mike Green regarding the suspension. In the response, Everson sent a draft of the news release with recommendations from a human resources firm that were bolded, highlighted and italicized.

One of the recommendations involved adding the word “potential” when referencing the infractions early in the release, but toward the end, it reads in part that “the work directive violated by Chief Moore is a first violation.”

According to time cards and personnel records, Moore never served the one-day suspension. There’s nothing about the incident in his or Lowe’s personnel files.

Late last year, Everson said he believed Moore served the suspension and said to check with Green. Everson prohibited his staff this month from talking about the issue, but Green already had responded to a March 5 email request for information about what happened.

“Chief Moore was off one day on paid administrative leave pending a meeting with him that resulted in coaching and an informal verbal warning. No further action was taken,” Green wrote March 13.

Green responded the following day that he had no further details and there is no documentation of when the discipline changed or how. Though Green is the safety service director, when Everson took office, he restructured the position to have both chiefs report directly to him instead.

City Auditor Luke Feeney said his office has no record of Moore having taken any paid or unpaid administrative leave between September and March.

Following the rules

According to Ohio law, the mayor has the “exclusive right” to suspend the police and fire chiefs. The law requires the mayor to certify the suspension with the civil service commission, a step that never happened in the case of Everson’s announcement that he was suspending Moore for one day.

The State Personnel Board of Review’s guidelines for conducting public hearings state notices of appeal should be filed with the civil service commission within 10 days of receiving a disciplinary order. If no order is provided — as seems to be the case with Moore because there is no record of the disciplinary action in his personnel file — the employee has 30 days from notice of the disciplinary action to file an appeal.

In an Aug. 28 email from Moore to Everson about a Loudermill, or predeprivation hearing, Moore withdrew his waiver of the hearing and said he would consult with his legal counsel about whether he would request a hearing.

Civil Service Commission meeting notes from September through February have no mention of any appeals or certifications of discipline concerning Moore or any other employee. In September, Everson told The Gazette that Moore was not requesting the hearing that typically would have been conducted with the human resources director to determine whether the discipline would be upheld.

Initially, Everson said he would have City Engineer Tom Day preside over the hearing because Moore is in a relationship with the human resources director.

There is no documentation that a hearing ever took place. There’s no report and there’s nothing in the bills from Dublin human resources firm Clemans, Nelson & Associates. The city hired the firm to assist with labor issues and union contract negotiations.

Emails and bills both confirm they had been consulting with the city on the Moore disciplinary issue. An Aug. 26 email even indicates Everson was considering suspending Moore and Lowe for three days.

Without the hearing, it appears the disciplinary action then should have gone before the Civil Service Commission for review but never did.

Important to document

Councilman Dustin Proehl, D-at large, leads the Chillicothe City Council’s Safety-Service Committee and said he was unaware there was a change to Moore’s discipline and assumed the suspension had been carried out.

He said it’s not unusual for administrative actions regarding personnel to not be shared with the council because they are up to the mayor. However, because of the high-profile nature of the situation, Proehl said it would have been nice to have known what happened.

Without documentation and without comment from Everson, it’s difficult to know what took place, when and why.

Ohio Revised Code Section 149.40 directs public offices to make “only such records as are necessary for the adequate and proper documentation of the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, and essential transactions of the agency and for the protection of the legal and financial rights of the state and persons directly affected by the agency’s activities.”

Although the law is broad on what entities must document, Proehl brought up concerns about liability the lack of documentation carries down the road if there are other disciplinary matters.

“Things like this, when they do occur, should be documented and placed in the file,” Proehl said, adding that documentation provides evidence if later discipline winds up being challenged. “Not having that in there hands over all the power to the employee.”

Proehl noted that although he and the rest of the council can’t dictate what the mayor does — public officials have no legal power over other public officials — knowing means they can raise concerns.

“It’s good to know because, otherwise, it just gets worse,” Proehl said.

The importance of documentation to create a clear line of progressive discipline was a lesson Everson said he had learned when the Civil Service Commission overturned his termination of former Fire Chief Bruce Vaughan in part because there was no documentation of progressive discipline.

He talked about it after placing a letter in Moore’s file about a March 2013 off-duty argument Moore had outside the Cozy Inn. In an April 10, 2013, news release about the Cozy incident, Everson wrote: “The incident has been properly filed into the personnel file of Chief Moore and any subsequent issues of any similar nature will result in progressive discipline.”

Although the Aug. 30 release never said anything would be placed in Moore’s file, Everson referenced the Cozy documentation, saying that the incident with Lowe was the first violation of the instructions given to him in April 2013.